d infantry fire was
three times what it was in the Franco-Prussian War. The flattening of
the trajectory, which means making the bullets go more nearly on a
straight line instead of traveling in an arc, has made the fire so
effective as to compel the soldiers to "travel on their stomachs." To
crawl along the ground like alligators, or advance like moles digging
their way into the earth.

The tremendous range of the modern rifle, single arm, or rapid-fire gun,
and the development of more powerful explosives for ammunition have
wrought this change. The bullet will travel a longer distance at a
horizontal position than in the old days when ordinary black powder and
a smooth-bore gun were used, and so at hundreds of yards distance the
soldiers can aim direct to kill, without making elevation allowances.

The machine gun has made it possible for the men to fire from four to
five shots for every one that was fired in the Franco-Prussian War and
probably ten for every one that was fired in the Civil War. The only
time the soldiers exposed themselves on the army frontiers were when
they were storming trenches, and this was not attempted until the trench
had suffered bombardment so it was made untenable.

DIFFICULT MOUNTAIN FIGHTING.

Probably nothing in the warfare of nations has been more colorful and
replete with surprises than the campaign waged by the Italian soldiers
on the Alpine passes between Italy and the Austrian strongholds, and in
the discussion of modern warfare, a brief description of some of the
work of these intrepid mountain fighters is interesting.

Much of this fighting has been the most difficult known in the annals of
modern warfare, save, perhaps, that done by the famous Younghusband
British Expedition to Thibet. And that, by comparison, was a very small
matter.

The mere height--altitude--at which the Italian warfare against the
Austrians was carried on has been sufficient to entail enormous
difficulties and a great additional strain, due actually to difficult
breathing in a rarefied atmosphere.

The warfare in the clouds which has characterized the struggle along the
Isonzo front has been conducted at an altitude seldom less than 8,000
and often rising to 12,000 feet, which is well within the realm of
eternal snow.

Naturally, therefore, most of the fighting was done in bitter cold. To
this fact add the other that the Italian soldiers who carried it on were
almost exclusively men who had not